Messages - ActionOfAll

Rayn, what would you recommend as a good resource to learn more about the philosophy of causality? Perhaps a non-mathematicians resource to becoming adequately acquainted with causality, thermodynamics, and statistical analysis in general?

This is not my area of study. Preferably something more advanced than a source for laymen, but not something for the advanced scholar who is an expert in that particular field.

The only thing I understand from that is the last part "You can think without giving words to your thought." which is true. The rest makes me contort my face and squint my eyes as I attempt to mentally squeeze some sort of substantial meaning out of that mess of words.

Rayn, it's laughable that you don't see the mind-brain problem as ontological. It's also laughable that you don't see it as a problem of causation.

You submit that anesthesia disrupts consciousness. This implies a causal connection, where the neurological-signaling changes which take place in the brain are causally responsible for the loss of consciousness. You also, in the same response, deny any problem of causality. Yet there is a problem, because the first person experience of consciousness is fundamentally a different type of phenomenon than the neural signals. The neural signals are empirical, whereas the first person consciousness experience is not. From a behavioral-functional perspective, there would be no explanatory problem, because the person under anesthesia stops behaving (an empirical observation) and neural signals are also blocked (an empirical observation).

However, to submit that an empirical phenomenon is the cause of a characteristically non-empirical phenomenon, without also supplying us with any sort of explanation to bridge this causal gap, is to simply suggest that a miracle occurs. So here comes the question, Rayn: are you submitting, as the qualified scientist that you are, that it's simply by some miracle that the signaling interruptions caused by anesthesia are responsible for loss of first person consciousness?

The notion that thoughts come from the brain is not definite or factual, as you two make it out to be. To say thoughts come from the brain is to suppose a causal link, yet then you cite mere correlational evidence. Furthermore, examine it in this way: What is a thought? Let's define it as non-physical experience.

You cited stuff from the 1960s. That's outdated and outmatched by modern research that can definitively provide a direct re-creation of human thoughts (they re-created visual thoughts for the time being, as that's probably the easiest to portray; I mean, after all, how do you portray a re-creation of the "thought" of a cat without the visuals?)

~Steve

Once again, correlational evidence... I've seen that study (the actual study, not the pop-sci report of it ). The brain obviously has activities which correlate to subjective reports. Therefore, if someone has a person think of a large array of images, mapping these correlates. They can have the person think of an unknown image, and, using the previously stored correlates, construct a very accurate guess. This is in no way causation, and it's disappointing that it has been interpreted that way...

Rayn:

The empirical data can be interpreted via whichever dialectic that scientist operates within. Empirical data does in fact mean two different things to two different scientists. Of course there is convergence as the body of available data grows... But when scientists themselves begin to make metaphysical claims about their discoveries (which they do, even in the sense that they take positivism for granted) they are blurring the lines between philosophy and science. The claims about the nature of reality collected via third-person experimentation (empirical data) are ontological (obviously). The difference is that the typical scientist will take for granted such ontological beliefs, rather than critically examining them.

In so far as scientists make claims about what their empirical data means about reality, they are making metaphysical claims. This is what happens when discussions of consciousness occur. As such, the authority should be an expert in philosophy of science, not a scientist. A philosopher of science would examine, in a second-order fashion, the ways in which the scientist comes to know, and the ways in which these support (or not) ontological claims. A scientist operates within their respective dialectic (usually positivist), whereas the philosopher examines it.

The layperson may have the tendency to drift towards the conceptual, but the conceptual is not necessarily the philosophical. The philosophical requires the appreciation and command of a meta-methodology, which is a skill that requires the habitual learning of particular methods of analysis and formulas, as well as the development of a large body of knowledge, and finally, development of meta-cognitive habits in day-to-day thinking.

Funny that you say enlightenment is the beginning - especially Nirvana, since Nirvana is supposed to be the extinguishment; annihilation; the finality; the deliverance. After Nirvana, there is no need for mental development...

"No sources just mathematic solving of the base physics laws and the requirements for ascension"

Define base physics laws. Then, if you've solved them, please post your proofs for all to see. Finally, demonstrate how the solving of these relates to ascension.

Otherwise the only level of ascension you've achieved is the mastery of word-salad.

There's more to magick than you know. I dare anyone to teleport to me and make me a student.

There's more to everything than I know. You fall into that same category. You know how Socrates knew the oracle was right about him being the wisest of all Athenians? Because he knew that he knew nothing. He knew that everyone else knew nothing as well. What made him different is that he realized it, while everyone else went around thinking they knew.

The moment you stop thinking of yourself as the humble student, open to reception of knowledge, is the moment you fall for delusions and trickery. Your levels of ascension are at best an honest but confused attempt, and at worst, product of pure grandeur.

Show me your so-called proofs, if you have them. Show me how the solution(s) to "base physics" (Whatever the fuck that means), define your currently empty terms (e.g. quasi or sub - math. Mathematical carrying, ascension, maturity). Otherwise, there's no reason for you, let alone anyone else, to give this system a serious consideration.

Moreover, the neuroscience field is heavily divided in terms of what the experts believe, which is why the reliance on their comments alone is insufficient; your conclusion would rely almost entirely (if not entirely) on whichever expert you chose to listen to that day.

Also, the term is not actually used in the correct context as I said, because once again, your conclusion does not follow from your premises...

" Look back at the first set of quotes - thoughts arise because of three points of knowledge that emerge from the brains processing power. Our subjective views come from our thoughts about things, and once again, thoughts come from the three points of knowledge that come from the brains processing."

Wow, that logic is just one big question begging Lol!

1. The brain has 3 points of knowledge2. These three points of knowledge create thought3. That the brain has 3 points of knowledge which create thought IS itself a thought4. Therefore the thought comes from the brain because the brain creates 3 points of knowledge which creates thought

Rayn: I already qualified my citation of Kant, as I am relying on Will Durant's sub 100 page exposition on the ideas of a man who wrote thousands of pages. Moreover, I don't even have the book anymore, so I'm relying purely on memory.

The goal which should be shared is to reduce the ambiguity as much as possible, and if not, don't talk about it.

You're not the only academic on this forum. I'm presenting at a conference in a few months... I'm the last one to suggest or support the disregarding of science - it's my field!

Incorrect usage of the term "sound". Also, in that same sentence, you're committing an appeal to authority (another fallacy).

sound - adjective - based on valid reasoning, sensible; thorough.

Your first post is also appealing to authority by quoting resources (Immanuel Kant), making your quote hypocritical and your argument null.

Actually it isn't an appeal to authority, because I'm not claiming that what Kant says must be true. I was merely suggesting an alternative, whereas you were implying that we should accept the neurologist's assertions simply because they are a neurologist. Of course, being an expert makes an idea put forth by said expert more credible than a non-expert's assertions, but by itself it is insufficient (especially with a subject so disputed even within the neuroscientific community).

Also, your usage of sound is again incorrect, because your reasoning isn't valid. The conclusion that thoughts "stem" from the brain is not substantiated by correlational evidence. This evidence could equally suggest that the brain and the subjective experience of thoughts both arise as different extensions of some other "thing".

True, no one really knows what mind is or how consciousness works, but according to experts in the field of brain science, the logical conclusion (a sound conclusion) is that they stem from the brain. Studies have shown that religious experiences can be duplicated by connecting electrodes to the scalp that manufacture visions of spirits and feelings of ecstacy (God or Koren Helmut), thus providing another argument for the power of the brain as an enigma that counteracts the altruistic and metaphysical perception of divine interaction.

I am not saying these discoveries are concrete, but that they are more viable than thoughts solely emerging from a metaphysical source. I practice various forms of metaphysics and have my own theories on how things work and understand them from a basic Western occult and Eastern holistic medical and mystical perspective, but science is on the leading edge of discovery that makes a lot of the old theories of magic and internal alchemy seem dogmatic, out dated, and even useless and harmful.

My academic program of study is titled "Wellness and Alternative Medicine". As such, we spend a lot of time evaluating alternative paradigms, because the healing modality extends from the paradigm within which the healer thinks. I was not arguing that thoughts emerge from a metaphysical source, and my allusion to Kant was supposed to suggest that there is an alternative way of thinking, where thoughts do not emerge from anywhere. Refer to my first post in which I outlined (in a rudimentary fashion... and in a way that I'm sure both Durant and Kant would be disappointed about) Kant's general notion of the mind being outside the causal operations.

To Rayn's refutation of my use of the fallacy:

Within the context of the argument, the usage of the fallacy was correct. This is because a neuroscientist is not qualified to make a philosophical claim, unless they are an expert not only in neuroscience but also in psychology and philosophical method. Moreover, because there is serious debate and a lack of general consensus within the field itself, one expert's opinion is different than another expert's opinion (within the same field). Therefore, the usage of an expert's ideas on the subject of mind-brain relationship as a way to convince the opposition that the idea should be accepted, is fallacious. If, however, the scientist in question was properly trained in philosophical and psychological method, and if the experts in the field agreed, this would be different.

Moreover, I am not the one who argued for a causal link - Mind_Bender did. My refutation was that if someone puts forth an argument proposing causality, then one should explicate the causal link. Mind_Bender's original argument is unsound, because the conclusion that thoughts arise from the brain is not necessitated by the premises.

All we need is one example, as you explicitly point out, of thoughts accompanying something other than a brain, to show that the brain is not what necessitates thought. It could be that both thoughts and brain are simply extensions of some superset. Although, I would disagree with you when you say: "You would say both thoughts and brains are subsets of some physical superset" because thoughts are characteristically nonphysical. Therefore, the superset would have to be composed of criteria other than physical, of which both thoughts and brains would still be extensions. Moreover, your assumption that thoughts are predicated by physical is also questionable.

Funny that you say enlightenment is the beginning - especially Nirvana, since Nirvana is supposed to be the extinguishment; annihilation; the finality; the deliverance. After Nirvana, there is no need for mental development...

"No sources just mathematic solving of the base physics laws and the requirements for ascension"

Define base physics laws. Then, if you've solved them, please post your proofs for all to see. Finally, demonstrate how the solving of these relates to ascension.

Otherwise the only level of ascension you've achieved is the mastery of word-salad.

In which direction does one move from these levels? Is enlightenment the beginning or end point? What is the rationale behind these particular levels in this particular order? What the hell do some of these even mean? If you did research, why have you not provided sources?

What is sound is neurologists having an exact premise for why and how thoughts are created. Take out the enigma, the brain having the processing power that it does lends to reason thoughts arise from the brain. These are from studies done on the brain itself not from people thinking about where thoughts come from. That, my friend, is illogical.

Neurologists are experts on the brain. What they're not experts on, by default, is neurophilosophy. Studies done on the "brain itself" are studies done collecting third person data. The collection of third person data does not currently support this third person phenomenon causing the existence of the first person perspective.

Take out your premises about processing power and enigma, and your argument then becomes: These people are experts on the brain, they say the brain causes the mind, therefore the brain causes the mind. Yet, this is an illogical argument, because although your conclusion COULD be true, the premises do not absolutely NECESSITATE it. This is simple informal logic.

Quoting numerous people who make a claim does not make the claim any more powerful. The fact that the brain is itself an enigma does not lend credence to the proposition that thoughts create the brain. All I see is an appeal to numbers fallacy and an unsound argument.

As you can see the brain is quite powerful and an enigma in itself, so it is highly likely, almost beyond a reasonable doubt, that our thoughts, that only we can see within our own subjective perception, arise from the brain.

The fact that the brain is an enigma in itself does not in any way suggest that our thoughts arise from the brain. The conclusion that it is likely that that thoughts arise from the brain does not follow from the premise that the brain is powerful and an enigma. This is an unsound argument.

Thoughts come from the brain. As a bunch of brain activity happens in whatever patterns, thoughts occur. Stop the brain activity, thoughts cease. Stop thinking, brain activity continues but in an altered manner (as shown by MRIs and whatnot).

However, for me, the real challenge is trying to understand where/what the little "television or computer monitor" inside your head is at, such that you can visually imagine objects and whatnot

Second to that, I do think there's a "Mind" which is somewhat distinguishable from the brain, in much the same way that an magnetic field is distinguishable from the magnet that produces it. But then there's the questions of what exactly the mind is, and how it works as different from the brain, and where the brain and mind connect and overlap, and whatnot.

Thoughts definitely come from the brain - neurons flying around your bio-computer - and are translated by the mind (whatever that really is), but thoughts of others (be they terrestrial or extra-dimensional) can enter your consciousness from an external source.

The notion that thoughts come from the brain is not definite or factual, as you two make it out to be. To say thoughts come from the brain is to suppose a causal link, yet then you cite mere correlational evidence. Furthermore, examine it in this way: What is a thought? Let's define it as non-physical experience. By non-physical I mean that which does not phenomenologically possess all the characteristics of physicality. Those characteristics being "extension, cohesion, caloricity, and vibration" (Moore, 1968). The brain, as a physical object, must possess these four characteristics. Thoughts, being nonphysical, do not possess these characteristics. Therefore, to assert that thoughts "definitely" arise from the brain is to assert that something defined by these characteristics produces something devoid of these characteristics.

When I say that the brain possesses these characteristics, I don't mean that there is some fundamental object which "possesses" these characteristics. Rather, the specific way in which these characteristics are realized IS the brain. The brain is not something beyond these characteristics which simply possesses them. The brain is a specific amalgamation and interaction of them. To propose that the brain is the cause of thoughts, then, is to use correlational evidence to attempt to substantiate an argument for nothing short of a miracle; a logical leap.

Moreover, thoughts are characteristically subjective. To suppose that thoughts come from somewhere before we experience them is to suppose that thoughts are at one point non-subjective; unexperienced. By definition, a thought must be experienced. So you are essentially supposing unexperienced experience - an oxymoron.

Immanuel Kant (you're probably familiar with the name) is a philosopher who revolutionized western metaphysics. He argued that causality is a way of perceiving things (in conjunction with linear time). It is a function of the "intellect" which is the word he uses to describe the perceptual organizing factor; that which creates perception. It is not a mere passive receiver of information, but an active creator. Thus, the intellect itself, as the creator of causality, is outside the causal system. In other words, the intellect produces causality but is not itself subject to the same laws, in the same way that one can build a machine that is constrained by certain rules but is not themselves constrained by the rules of their invention. As such, the mind is a creative center not subject to causality, though it creates perception, and causality is one of the constraints that consists of the perception it creates. This is my interpretation of Will Durant's chapter on Kant in his The Story of Philosophy. (Durant, 1961).

Work Cited

Durant, W. (1961). The story of philosophy: The lives and opinions of the great philosophers of the western world. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Moore, Charles A. (Ed.). (1967). The Indian Mind: Essentials of Indian Philosophy and Culture.University of Hawaii, Honolulu: East-West Center Press.